Let me offer a revised and improved version of my first comment posted 6/14/09, I meant to say that the speaker in the 'The Angel' withheld a secret of a shameful deed from the heavenly visitor. And it's not 'Willie's' feminine side that he is ashamed of, but whatever it is it bothers him no end! Where some of you get your notions from leaves me befuddled at times!
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In this poem the Poet (not necessarily the biographical Blake) denies himself the feminine side that would have made him whole. He sees himself in a dream as female and weeps to be depicted so. But though he weeps he knows his heart’s delight would be to incorporate that element into his psyche, yet keeps that secret from the mild Angel, and loses the opportunity. As he grows older he fortifies himself against this female side, and again given the opportunity to balance his nature, is so set in his masculinity that the Angel comes in vain. Perhaps Blake here is emphasising the need to balance the Yin and the Yang in the human psyche.
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oh! willie you finally found somebody that respect your feminine side which you fear to be discovered but too old to get out of the closet...probably everybody know
they just ain't telling you.
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it is a man great in sound guarding the innocence of youth knowing the grey holds sway, words though son in thought in time it fades to grave, beautys grace rule of law keeps most safe...iip..short is breath held lives to long, in song..
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I dreamed a dream that I was a virgin queen guarded by a messenger sent from God to protect me and guide me. My angel soothed my fears at first, but I hid secret delights from him. The secrecy grew and festered in me like a deadly growth which the angel recognized and at once withdrew. The rosy red of dawn revealed and brought to light my secret sins. I withdrew behind a defensive position, fortified and armed against a divine incursion into my secret realm. When the messenger appeared again, he realized the futility of his mission, for my youth had fled and I had fallen into the sere of life - all was withered and gray.I had chosen to reject God's good graces and denied access to the divine messenger with the good news.
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Wonderful, I'd say - to be armed with the mistakes of youth that they now become, in the grey years, the weapons to fight the battle of life. The angels in our youth train us on how to deal with our failings and this experience thus becomes the stuff of our life, renewing us in the grey years grown from our youth
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W.Blake writes as if the Goddess, The Holy Ghost, The Mother speaks and refers to these meta modern times, the Last Judgment.
In the beginning Blake refers to the time
The Goddess came on this earth as Mother Mary.
At that time human beings were not at the level to
Understand the Divine Incarnation of Her Son,
So She wept a lot.
But, after 2.000 years the morning broke again and
The Goddess again walks this earth.
In a human body She came once more but
in it all Her forms were drawn.
She has come to fight this time
with all Her forms and weapons divine,
the ignorance in human mind.
The Infinite in the finite dwells but
manifested on the forty-seventh year of age.
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